Welcome to the Enid Blyton Society, Christophe!
I'm fairly new here myself. In addition to being a fan of Enid Blyton, I am a translator, and one area that I am interested in is the continuation novels of Enid Blyton series like the Famous Five. In fact, I am currently working on a Web site in which I hope to catalogue all the additional books written in French and German, as well as English. I am also working on translating one of the Famous Five books by Claude Voilier that have not yet been translated into English. At present, I'm about two-thirds of the way through that.
This is what I know about the German Famous Five books (the printed ones, that is; I'm not so familiar with the audio ones). There are currently 50 titles in print. The first 21 are translations of the original 21 books by Enid Blyton. The 22nd is a translation of
Five Have a Puzzling Time and Other Stories, also by Enid Blyton. Nos. 23-40 are translations (from English!) of the 18 Claude Voilier FF stories that were translated from French into English by Anthea Bell. But Nos. 41-50 are entirely new stories, and they are written by Sarah Bosse. The 50th book is a special "two-in-one" volume.
Concerning the "ghost" books: I am not aware of the the Barney or Secret ones, although I would certainly like to learn more about those, as well as about any other German continuation novels in these series. But I can provide plenty of information about the Famous Five ones. Here's an excerpt from my new Web site (not yet online, so you're being treated to a "sneak preview" here):
Books by Brigitte Blobel
The two books by Blobel purported to be “translations” of Enid Blyton Famous Five titles. Blobel was credited as the “translator”. The problem was, neither title that she “translated” actually existed in English! They were in fact her own original works. Consequently, her books were swiftly withdrawn from publication by German publisher Bertelsmann after Darrell Waters Ltd., which administered the copyrights of Enid Blyton’s works for many years until Chorion plc bought them, objected. So they are naturally pretty hard to find, and they are unlikely to ever be reprinted. It’s a shame, because they are apparently reasonably close to Blyton in style and spirit (at least, according to a commentator on one German site). But here now is the list of those titles:
No.: 1
Title: Fünf Freunde auf der verbotenen Insel (Literal translation: The Famous Five on the Forbidden Island)
Year of First Publication: 1977 (by Bertelsmann)
No.: 2
Title: Fünf Freunde und der blaue Diamant (Literal translation: The Famous Five and the Blue Diamond)
Year of First Publication: 1979 (by Bertelsmann)
Remarks: Although this title is the same as the 18th Claude Voilier Famous Five book (and even published in the same year as the latter!), it appears not to be a translation of Voilier’s book. From the scant information I can gather about this book, it involves the Famous Five going to France, whereas in Voilier’s book of the same title, they go to India.
That ends the excerpt. Now, this "Zwei Freunde" is rather interesting. There is an English series called "Just George", which features George as a nine-year-old and is meant to be a "prequel" to the Famous Five adventures. The German "Zwei Freunde" series is in fact a translation of the Just George series. Here is what my research on Amazon.co.uk and Amazon.de has uncovered:
Just George No. 1:
George, Timmy and the Haunted Cave, by Sue Weldon and Sue Welford. Published by Knight in 2000
Zwei Freunde Nr. 1:
Zwei Freunde und die Geisterhöhle, translated by Anna Claudia Wang. Published by Omnibus Hc Bei Bertelsmann in 2001
Just George No. 2:
George, Timmy and the Curious Treasure, by Sue Welford. Published by Hodder Children's books in 2000
Zwei Freunde Nr. 2:
Zwei Freunde und die rätselhafte Schatz, translated by Anna Claudia Wang. Published by Omnibus Hc Bei Bertelsmann in 2001
Just George No. 3:
George, Timmy and the Footprint in the Sand, by Sue Welford. Published by Hodder Children's Books in 2000
Zwei Freunde Nr. 3:
Zwei Freunde und die Spur im Sand, translated by Anna Claudia Wang.
Just George No. 4:
George, Timmy and the Secret of the Cellar, by Sue Welford. Published by Hodder Children's Books in 2000
Zwei Freunde Nr. 4:
Zwei Freunde und das Geheimnis im Keller, translated by Anna Claudia Wang. Published by Omnibus Hc Bei Bertelsmann in 2001
Just George No. 5:
George, Timmy and the Stranger in the Storm, by Sue Welford. Published by Hodder Children's Books in 2000
Zwei Freunde Nr. 5:
Zwei Freunde und der unbekannte Junge, translated by Anna Claudia Wang. Published by Omnibus Hc Bei Bertelsmann in 2001
Just George No. 6:
George, Timmy and the Lighthouse Mystery, by Sue Welford. Published by Hodder Children's Books in 2000
Zwei Freunde Nr. 6:
Zwei Freunde und das Versteck im Leuchtturm, translated by Anna Claudia Wang. Published by Omnibus Hc Bei Bertelsmann in 2001
I didn't really know about this series, or if I did know about it, I'd completely forgotten it. It looks as though the books in this series are out of print in both languages.
At the moment, I don't know as much about the Malory Towers/Dolly or St. Clares/Hanni und Nanni series, although I plan to learn more for the sake of my new site. The Tina and Tini series appears to contain 14 titles. The first two titles are based on one-off books that Enid Blyton wrote (
The Treasure Hunters and
The Boy Next Door), but the rest seem to be entirely new stories written by German authors, although the books all have Enid Blyton's logo on the covers.
Anyway, I hope this has been of interest and that the information is useful.